


Support

by JulyStorms



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-17
Updated: 2015-05-17
Packaged: 2018-03-30 22:27:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3954133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JulyStorms/pseuds/JulyStorms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For just a moment, fleeting and stupid and childish, he wanted to touch her, wanted to smooth out the skin between her eyebrows, wanted to press his fingers into her shoulders. It was laughable, really—as if it would do any good.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Support

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place before the Survey Corps finds Eren and Historia beneath the chapel. If you can figure out where I drew inspiration from this, you're probably a genius.

Jean Kirschtein was nobody special.

He liked to think he was, sometimes, liked to pretend to be someone strong, someone sturdy and dependable. It felt nice to be trusted.

Maybe if he pretended long enough, it would stick with him, become a part of him. These days, he wanted that more than anything. Their entire world was falling apart; nothing at all was okay anymore. Maybe it never would be. Maybe they were all fighting in vain, fighting titans/humans/the _world_ —

Since Eren and Historia had been abducted (and Jean would never call it anything less), Mikasa's face had changed. Her eyebrows remained drawn together, her lips pressed into a thin, chapped line, and there were lines on her face that had no business being there.

She still looked beautiful, he thought, as she rounded the side of the building to take his place for the rest of the night. It was quiet and dark; the moon was nothing but a shitty sliver in the sky, but that was for the best. Darkness made good cover. But it made the light in her eyes look dim and it kept her hair from shining the way he knew it was supposed to. She was tired, the weight of her world, and the missing chunk of it, carried in the lift of her shoulders.

For just a moment, fleeting and stupid and childish, he wanted to touch her, wanted to smooth out the skin between her eyebrows, wanted to press his fingers into her shoulders. It was laughable, really—as if it would do any good. As if he, the lesser soldier of the two of them, would be able to take away even a fraction of what she was feeling.

He couldn't. He knew that. He knew it but wanted it, anyway. What a shitty world they lived in, where kids went to war to fight monsters who had once been men and women and children; where the government's corruption trickled into the military and over the entire known fucking world; where they were trapped within walls that they had always believed existed to protect them. What a joke their world/lives/existence was.

What a sick joke.

Mikasa didn't say anything. Since they'd lost Eren and Historia's trail, she had said very little. Jean couldn't fault her for it. He couldn't really fault her for anything.

Her fingers wrapped around the rifle he held, not quite brushing against his, and he hated himself, then, for just a fraction of a moment, for being pleased that Eren wasn't there. The feeling faded as she took the gun, as she leaned against the wall beside him, as she waited for him to leave.

He couldn't do it, though—couldn't command his feet to carry him forward, couldn't do anything but look at the downward tilt of her chin and shadows that remained static on her face.

Everything in him froze, and he didn't know what he was going to say until he said it.

"Mikasa." It was spoken softly, but her name sounded rough on his tongue; it didn't sound the way he wanted it to, the way she deserved it to.

She looked up immediately as if he had an answer for her, as if he had something intelligent to say. He didn't. He was sorry for that. He was a sham, really; he wasn't dependable and he wasn't strong and he didn't know a damn thing. He was just a kid, really, fighting to be allowed to become a man.

Her lips parted slightly as if she were prepared to ask him what it was he wanted to say, but they went slack and her eyes grew confused when he reached for the scarf that was wrapped securely around her neck.

He didn't know very much about Mikasa, but he knew about the scarf: sort of. He knew it was important to her for reasons she'd probably never share with him. He didn't need to know: not now, maybe not ever.

The red fabric looked nearly black in the dark, and the ends of her hair brushed against the knuckles of his right hand before he found one end of her scarf. There were at least twenty things he wanted to do, in that moment, with her looking up at him, the confusion in her eyes fading to something patient and understanding. She trusted him.

He didn't know why. He didn't deserve it.

"Look," he said, rubbing the soft, worn fabric of her scarf between his fingers; the motion was almost done absently.  His eyes remained on her face, of course. He couldn't look away. He didn't want to. He cleared his throat and willed the darkness to hide the warmth that threatened to color his cheeks and the tips of his ears. His voice grew softer: "Look," he said, forcing a confidence into his voice that he didn't feel but wanted desperately to, "we're gonna find that little shithead, and—"

And what—she'd go running to him and never let him go? Probably.

But if it took the unnatural lift away from her shoulders and smoothed the skin of her face, he'd be pleased with the outcome. Jealous as hell, maybe, though he had no right to be, but seeing her hurting like this was something he never wanted to see again.

Jean swallowed hard: "—and I don't know." He tugged gently on the end of her scarf. "But we _will_ find him, all right?"

Mikasa didn't smile; he didn't expect her to. She nodded, though, just barely, eyes still on him.

"Good," he said.

He considered trying to be funny about it: he thought about telling her he'd punch Eren right in his stupid face when he saw him next, but it didn't seem right, somehow, not with her looking at him like that—like she trusted him, like she wanted nothing more than to believe him.

He forced himself to let go of her scarf, to walk away before he could say or do something unforgivably stupid.

He was just about to turn the corner around the side of the building when he heard Mikasa's voice:

"Thank you, Jean."

It was strong and genuine and it made both his footsteps and his heart falter.


End file.
